Blitzkrieg And Cold War Commander

After a few games of Future War Commander, our club has got a bit of a thing for the other games in the stable, Blitzkrieg Commander and Cold War Commander. Tanks are being ordered, and basing ideas discussed, and there could be some grand tank battles on the way in the next few months.

Last night Ralph set up a couple of small games, one of BKC and one of FWC so that people could try out the systems. Everyone would have a chance to play each game at least once, and possibly swap sides and do it again.

The WWII game was a small action set in NW Europe in 1944, with a British company supported by some tanks advancing on an objective just beyond a village. The Germans had a platoon of infantry supported by some mortars and an MG.

Here's the table.

Note that each base is a small diorama; Ralph likes his figures presented in a grand manner.

The German mortars were mounted in half-tracks.

Oh, and the British had air-support, although it was rarely on target.

Here's the British on their start line and showing off the basing. Those are 15mm figures. With the large base sizes we double all distances in the game.

I don't know if any British player captured the objective in the six turns they had. I came close, with my tanks stopping about 5cm short then failing to activate again. And at one stage Caesar had his reconnaissance unit on the objective, but it was driven off. The Germans has a fairly tough time defending, though, with most player's greatest opponent being their own command and control.

On the other table we had an Arab/Israeli setup in 6mm. Geoff umpired it. A force of Arab T62s stormed a hill-line defended by a bunch of Israeli Centurion tanks. With no cover this was a very one-sided scenario.

The Arabs.

And the great expanse they had to cross, out-ranged and out-gunned.

The inevitable burning tanks ...

In three games the Arabs managed to knock out one base of Israeli tanks. Like I say ... one-sided. But a useful exercise in how the firing mechanisms work if nothing else.

So we have all had a taster of these two games (I'd played some BKC a while back, but not for ages, and I've not read the rules before). I think we're fired up to try a bigger, 'proper' game now.

Thanks to Ralph and Geoff for setup and umpiring.

Under The Suns Of Tatooine

John and I played 25mm HOTT last night. He wanted to try out his new Star Wars Sand-People army, so I took the 'Sororitas Puella Armatura Mobilis' into battle with them, as it's the only vaguely sci-fi themed army I have in that scale.

Here's the first game - the Sand-People defended. The consist of four Shooters, three Warband, two Beasts, one Hero and a Blade general. The Sisters were four Warband, two Flyers, a Paladin and two Heroes, one of which is the general.

The Sisters have one tactic - charge and kill. It's a small army and needs to move fast to avoid being outflanked or caught in a slogging fight. So here they are making their first strike.

Saint Rachel took on the Beasts but got caught up in a draw.

The first game ended with the Sand-People being pretty much cut to pieces over a couple of rounds of combat - the Sisters' Heroes hit some Shooters with enough support to take them out and the Sand-People line collapsed from that point.

This was the second game. John took the Sand-People again, and defended again. The Sand-People formed a strong line, and their Shooters took out one of the Sisters' Fliers early on. I was left with one option - charge!

I lot a couple of Warband, and one of the Heroes, and we pretty much traded element for element. But the Sisters prevailed. Just - 12AP to 10AP.

The third and final game. We swapped armies, but the Sand-People still defended. I was a little more free-wheeling with the Tatooine natives, mostly because half of my army ended up with no opposition.

I lost - 12AP to 0AP. I did have a viable stab at the Sisters' general, though. An element of Beasts hit her in the flank:

When she turned to face the Beasts had to be pushed back to make room, nudging them into some bad going. This left them one factor up - +4 to the general's +3. And the general had nowhere to retreat to.

But I lost the combat. Oh well.

So, three games for the Sisters. They are a tough, hard-hitting little army, although the second game showed that they could be vulnerable in a sustained fight.

On the other table Geoff and Ralph played Cold War Commander, running a test game based on the 1973 Vale of Tears battle between the Israelis and the Syrians. There were a small number of units in play, but it seemed to give a good game, and they had time to play it through twice, swapping sides. I think the Israelis were victorious in both games, but only just.

Syrian tanks advance. Note the minimalist terrain.

Burning command vehicles. Ralph's, of course.

Israeli Centurion tanks.